Mislabeled Tractor Supply/Feed Store Chicks

[Chelsa'sChicks]

How do they do that? Sex link males and females hatch different colors, and some barred breeds and duckwing breeds you can make a good guess on based on color pattern, but the rest would have to be vent sexed. I'm not sure I would trust that they can actually tell the difference.

I never buy ducks so I a only talking about chickens. They go off color and feathering. They have always been right so far!

 

[pennyJo1960]

We have a tsc in Chehalis every now and then stop just to see there was one gal
worth her salt the rest wouldn't give a plug nickle for

 

[Pyxis]

I never buy ducks so I a only talking about chickens. They go off color and feathering. They have always been right so far!

I was talking about chickens too Color only works in some breeds and feather sexing only works if the chick's parents were crossed on purpose to create the genetics to do that. So if they've gotten it right so far not based on sex linking or the few breeds like barred rocks whose gender you can make an accurate guess at by down pattern, then it's been luck

 

[Chelsa'sChicks]

I was talking about chickens too Color only works in some breeds and feather sexing only works if the chick's parents were crossed on purpose to create the genetics to do that. So if they've gotten it right so far not based on sex linking or the few breeds like barred rocks whose gender you can make an accurate guess at by down pattern, then it's been luck

Yes I am aware of that fact of genetics . They have been right about multiple breeds I've bought, not all the staff are educated, but most. They have looked at feathers/wings and coloring and been accurate so far. My point is not all TSC are ignorant and some are knowledgeable.

 

[CSAchook]

Oh, I don't buy from hatcheries. I'm too much of a chicken snob for that. I breed and raise show birds - brahmas, ko shamos, and ayam cemanis. I have been breeding ayam cemanis for going on six years now. My extra roosters either find homes or get donated to feed the raptors at a place that rehabilitates them near me.

I usually don't buy from TSC either, but I broke for the turkeys, lol.

That is so neat!

 

[Pyxis]

Yes I am aware of that fact of genetics . They have been right about multiple breeds I've bought, not all the staff are educated, but most. They have looked at feathers/wings and coloring and been accurate so far. My point is not all TSC are ignorant and some are knowledgeable.

Oh, I was wondering why you were thinking I was talking about ducks and realized that you must have thought when I said duckwing I was talking about ducks. I wasn't, I was talking about chickens that are duckwing in color. Welsummers for example are red duckwing and can be sexed by markings.

If they were looking at the wings to sex them, that would be the feather sexing I was talking about, which doesn't work unless you cross males that are homozygous for rapid feather growth with females that carry only one slow feather growth allele. As you would think, usually you have to cross two different breeds to achieve this, so only hybrids that were specifically created for this purpose can be done this way. Just posting this for others who might read through this thread and not know this, since you said you already do

There definitely are some employees at TSC that know what they're doing, but that's because they own chickens themselves or took the time to educate themselves. Sadly, Tractor Supply on its own does not give its employees any training about the chicks.

That is so neat!

Yes! It's a good use for the extra boys - they don't go to waste, and it helps out birds in need.

 

[Chelsa'sChicks]

There definitely are some employees at TSC that know what they're doing, but that's because they own chickens themselves or took the time to educate themselves. Sadly, Tractor Supply on its own does not give its employees any training about the chicks.

Agreed 100%. I do believe that most that are educated either own their own chickens or have worked there for a while..

 

[rosemarythyme]

I think most of the time if you run into a feed store employee that's more knowledgeable about chickens, they usually have some of their own. The others might be happy to try and help you, but I see them madly googling breed photos to figure out what they're looking at.

Thankfully my feed store only gets meat birds by request, so no chance of someone accidentally getting the wrong chicks.

 

[Nats Chickens]

Yep, big difference between a little six pound leghorn and a 40 pound turkey! But I have emus, so these guys still won't be the biggest birds I have

Do you live in Australia? If not where did you get emus from?!


To me, TSC sounds like heaven! Just waltzing in, buying chicks and ducklings left and right, raising them and seeing what they turn out to be, giving away the ones I can't keep to my friends on a hobby farm....yep, heaven!

 

[Pyxis]

Do you live in Australia? If not where did you get emus from?!

Hatched them! I'm in the US.

Haha, don't give me an excuse to show you emu pictures